NBI executive sued before the ombudsman

IT will be now up to the Office of the Ombudsman to pursue the filing of graft charges before the Sandigan-bayan if it has found substantial evi-dence against a ranking official of the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) which has been accused by an information technology (IT) firm for withholding payment to the services it rendered to the agency.

In the same complaint, Ragos was accused by lawyer Orlando Dizon, RDMSI’s vice president for external affairs, for deliberately withholding payment of at least P14-million for the services the IT firm rendered to the agency from July to September this year.

Moreover, the services the RDMSI rendered to NBI from October to December last year amounting to P17,225,361.90 were not paid based on quantum merit basis des-pite due demands, Dizon said.

The NBI official (Ragos) has allegedly refused to process its unpaid billings, causing undue injury to its operations in 68 clearance-facility sites nationwide, the com-plaint said further.

It turns out that Justice Secretary Leila de Lima and NBI Director Nonnatus Rojas have already di-rected Ragos, whose office is in charge of contracts of the bureau with private firms, to comply with an earlier demand for payment by RDMSI.

But Ragos still failed to deliver and instead questioned the contract forged by RDMSI with the NBI in December last year.

The firm then seeks for the preventive suspension of Ragos to prevent him “from further using his position and powers and prero-gatives of his office as an instrument of personal vendetta and to influence potential witnesses of tampering with records which may be vital in the prosecution of this case.”

Extra Bonus for Exemplary Performance

On top of their 13th month pay and year-end cash bonus, the Navotas City employees were luckier as compared with the workers in other local governments as they get Performance-Enhance-ment Incentive (PEI).

Mayor John Rey Tiangco re-veals that the incentive is meant to “to recognize their support, com-mitment and collaborative efforts for the efficiency and savings of the city government.”

Furthermore, the city mayor says that “providing PEI to Navotas’ public servants is also one way to motivate the government workers to serve the public.”

The additional cash benefit came solely from the funds of the local government “appropriated for newly created but vacant positions the realignment of which was autho-rized by the Sangguniang Pan-lungsod.”